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The Einstein@Home Project

Einstein@Home is a distributive computing project created to analyze data from the LIGO and GEO 600 experiments, which are searching for gravity waves created by astronomical events across our galaxy. A team of N.A.A. members is donating spare processing time on their personal computers to run a program which analyzes raw data from the experiments, hunting for the signals which might be created by gravity waves. You can help, too! All you need is a computer which has Internet access to download data and upload results; the processing software is available for a number of operating systems. The faster the processor, the more data your machine can crunch; while dial-up Internet connections can be used, an always-on DSL or cable connection is easier to manage.

Gravity Waves

The search for gravity waves has been going on for many decades. Of all the forces of nature, gravity is the one we understand the least; in theory, it probably has a wave form, akin to electromagnetic energy, but its waves have never been detected. If they exist, their strongest surges will be caused by astronomical events involving massive objects such as neutron stars and black holes. Their discovery would tell us much about not just gravity and all the forces of nature but about the astronomical objects themselves. The Einstein@Home project has a nice Guide, which tells more about, the search for gravity waves, the experiments involved, and the Einstein@Home project.

Our Team

Since the Naperastro.org Gravity Hunters team formed in early 2005, we have consistently been in the top 100 teams as far as both weekly work output and total results. Not bad, since as of 2/1/02, over 4,500 Einstein@Home teams had been created all around the globe! Here is another look at our current team statistics, and Here is our official Einstein@Home page.

Why not join the team? Let your computer's spare time make a real contribution to science! Check at work, too, to see if distributive computing is allowed to fill the spare time of machines there, too. Here is a link to the Einstein@Home form to start you on the way!